Osaka 1615 - The last battle of the samurai

The Osaka campaign - or rather campaigns, because it consisted of two distinct winter and summer operations - holds a unique place in Japanese history. The battle ofTennoji in 1615, with which the fighting at Osaka concluded, was to be the last occasion in which two armies of samurai would engage one another in a pitched battle. It also saw the final appearance on the field of war of Tokugawa Ieyasu, whose victory at Osaka secured his family's hegemony for the next two and a half centuries. But the Osaka campaign was also notable for a number of firsts. Because the fall of Osaka Castle was publicized by means of a woodblock-printed broadsheet, the campaign became the first event in Japanese history to be reported in anything resembling a newspaper. It was also the first major occurrence in Japan to be described in the English language - this was through the reports and letters prepared by the East India Company from its trading post in Japan. It was entirely appropriate that they should do so, because artillery supplied by the East India Company played a decisive role in the fall of the castle when it was used in the first long-range bombardment in Japanese history.
Download (rapidshare.com)